Two exhibitions currently on view at the Vitra Design Museum shine a big spotlight on design in Africa. One explores the present: how design is promoting political and economic change through every medium from graphic design to architecture. Making Africa: A Continent of Contemporary Design (through September 9, 2015) features the architecture of Francis Kéré, objects by Cheik Diallo, and work from designers of many disciplines.The other traces the past. Architecture of Independence: African Modernism (through May 31, 2015) documents more than 50 experimental buildings, in Central and Sub-Saharan Africa, through which emerging nations expressed their national identities after their independence in the 1960s. The exhibition was curated by architect and author Manuel Herz and includes photographs by Iwan Baan. Click through the slideshow to view a sampling of the work in the two exhibitions.
Two Exhibitions Give New Perspective to African Design

Hotel Ivoire, Abidjan (Côte d’Ivoire), by Heinz Fenchel and Thomas Leiterdorf, 1962-1970
Photo © Iwan Baan

La Pyramide, Abidjan (Côte d’Ivoire), by Rinaldo Olivieri, 1973
Photo © Iwan Baan

Hotel Independence, Dakar (Senegal), by Henri Chomette and Roland Depret, 1973-1978
Photo © Iwan Baan

FIDAK - Foire Internationale de Dakar, Dakar (Senegal), by Jean Francois Lamoureux & Jean-Louis Marin, 1974
Photo © Iwan Baan

University of Zambia - UNZA, Lusaka (Zambia),by Julian Elliott, 1965-1970
Photo © Iwan Baan

Mfantsipim School (Ausschnitt), Cape Coast (Ghana), by Fry, Drew and Partners, 1958
Photo © Manuel Herz

Independence Arch, Accra (Ghana) by the Public Works Departments, 1961
Photo © Manuel Herz

Kenyatta International Conference Centre, Nairobi (Kenya), by Karl Henrik Nostvik, 1967-1973
Photo © Iwan Baan

Kenyatta International Conference Centre, Nairobi (Kenya), by Karl Henrik Nostvik, 1967-1973
Photo © Iwan Baan

School of Engineering at KNUST (Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology), Kumasi (Ghana), by James Cubitt, 1956
Photo © Alexia Webster

Stadium at KNUST (Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology), Kumasi (Ghana), by KNUST Development Office, 1964-1967
Photo © Alexia Webster










